A Peek Into the Future

[deacon blues]

Do you remember election night 1988? Do you remember that historic race for the White House between Michael Dukakis, Democratic governor of Massachusetts and Republican Vice President George Herbert Walker Bush? If you do remember, you probably recall the infamous "Willie Horton" ad. You probably recall the phrase "card-carrying member of the ACLU". Remember Democrat VP candidate Lloyd Benson's debate with the GOP VP candidate Dan Quayle and his comment, "Senator Quayle, I knew Jack Kennedy, and you're no Jack Kennedy."?

Since I am discussing your memory, I want you to think about your feelings that night. Remember when they were calling various states for the two candidates how you felt when California was called for Dukakis? Did you shout for joy or did you hang your head? Did you exclaim "thank God for the Left Coast!" or did you say "well what do you expect from the land of fruits and nuts!"? When California was called for Dukakis were you thrilled at the prospect of your candidate winning the fifty-five electoral college votes it provided to him or were you devastated knowing that winning California gave Dukakis a tremendous advantage?

Were you able to get a sense of how you felt that night? The funny thing is, if you recall feeling angst about Dukakis winning California or you remember excitement, your memory has failed you. The reality is this: California did not vote to send a liberal governor from Massachusetts to live on Pennsylvania Avenue. California voted for George HW Bush.

The reason I was able to pull a cheap stunt on you like the above is because our ability to remember is frequently flawed. When we try to recall the past we have a tendency to make mistakes about details and feelings, facts and emotions. And in the same way we are prone to error when attempting to predict the facts about the future and how we will feel about the condition, the emotions and the details of tomorrow.

Right now some young man is getting a skull and crossbones tattoo on his arm with the ageless motto DEATH ROCKS emblazened underneath it. Right now he thinks this is a good idea. Right now his vision of the future is one of having a sense of pride and happiness about the body art being injected under his skin. He can't imagine changing his mind about this decision, nor can he fathom that at the age of 80 he will probably not think too fondly of impending death.

I recently passed a billboard advertising a tattoo removal business. Evidently someone who had "I love Harriet" tattooed on their shoulder made a grave error in judgment about the future (not to mention Harriet) and consequently regretted the decision to have her name forever embedded into his body for all the world to see. With the rise in the popularity of tattoos has come a whole new industry of fixing the consequences of poor judgments about the future. Our inability to accurately predict what we will want and feel in the future, about what will happen and what will be the consequences of our choices is a real problem for us. Fortunately tattoos can be removed. Unfortunately most poor choices have a point of no return with irrevocable consequences.

Remembering the past incorrectly can be easily adjusted with eyewitness accounts, written histories, and the truth about what took place. Poor eyesight can be easily adjusted with contacts or glasses. A flawed vision of the future is a much more complicated issue. Predicting the future is a tough business. It's also big business. The whole gambling industry is built on the belief that most people are wrong about the future, whether it's which horse will win the race, which team will win the game, or which numbers will show up in the lottery drawing, the roulette wheel or the slot machine.

That puts us in a risky position. That makes decision making really scary. Choices about whom to marry, where to live, how to raise children, what career path to take, where to go to church, how to spend money, and a list of many other choices greatly influence our futures and whether we will be successful and happy or failures and full of regret. Some folks decide not to choose. Some folks decide to avoid making mistakes about the future by circumnavigating the whole decision making process altogether. But not making a decision is a decision in and of itself. Yes, there are consequences even for the "non-choices" in life.

The fact is we have to make choices. And since we are all headed unavoidably toward the future, shouldn't we try to make the best choices as possible? Do we just roll the dice and hope we get lucky? Do we embrace the notion of fate and resign ourselves to the idea that success or failure is essentially a coin toss? Is there some other way to get a peek into the future to help us determine what choices are best for us and what decisions will help us secure a satisfying tomorrow?

There are two ways to learn: firsthand knowledge or secondhand knowledge. Most everything that we know today is secondhand. Somebody told us. Somebody showed us. Somebody taught us. We learned it in school. We learned it by reading a book. We learned it through oral histories. We went to a museum. We visited a battlefield. We watched a documentary or a biography. The average Junior High student knows more about the world and the universe than the great minds of history. It's an amazing fact: most fourteen year olds know more than Aristotle, Galileo, Leonardo and the other great people of history. How? Through the discoveries that each one made, passed down from generation to generation, building upon each other's understanding and setting the stage for future generations to learn more.

Fortunately there is a simple solution. I Corinthians 10:11-12 (NLT) says "All these events happened to them as examples for us. They were written down to warn us, who live at the time when this age is drawing to a close.
If you think you are standing strong, be careful, for you, too, may fall into the same sin." The Message translation says "These are all warning markers—danger!—in our history books, written down so that we don't repeat their mistakes. Our positions in the story are parallel—they at the beginning, we at the end—and we are just as capable of messing it up as they were. Don't be so naive and self-confident. You're not exempt. You could fall flat on your face as easily as anyone else. Forget about self-confidence; it's useless. Cultivate God-confidence."

[deacon blues]

The Bible is filled with stories of people just like you and me who although they lived in a different time and culture faced similar challenges and choices. They succeeded, they failed. They won, they lost. They were confident, they were weak. They believed, they disobeyed. And we have the fortune of being able to read their stories and gleaning wisdom about our lives and futures based on their experiences.

I don't have to wonder what an extra-marital affair might do for my future. I can look at the story of David and can see that the consequence of that choice was devastating for his future. I don't have to roll the dice on should I obey God or do things my own way. I can read about King Saul and watch how he slowly spiraled downward to an ignominious death simply because he refused to yield to God and obey His commands unapologetically. Solomon tried it all: money, fame, women, food, wine, pleasure, power, materialism. His conclusion at the end of his life? They are all empty pursuits. They are all vain passions. To serve God and obey His commandments is the whole purpose of man.

I can read about Peter's denial and devastation and subsequent restoration and dynamic ministry following and can see how one can make a regrettable decision and yet recover. I can understand through God's Word that being mistake prone even as a Christian is inevitable, yet my future is not a total loss because of my failures. Like an unwanted tattoo I can employ God's "Sin Removal Service" and He can erase my wrongs and change the course my life would have taken otherwise. He makes "crooked paths straight". He restores the "years that the worm has stolen."

There is also another valuable resource all around us that can help us get a glimpse into our future. II Corinthians 3:2-3 (NLT) says "Your lives are a letter written in our hearts, and everyone can read it and recognize our good work among you. Clearly, you are a letter from Christ prepared by us. It is written not with pen and ink, but with the Spirit of the living God. It is carved not on stone, but on human hearts." The Message translates this passage thus, "Your very lives are a letter that anyone can read by just looking at you. Christ himself wrote it—not with ink, but with God's living Spirit; not chiseled into stone, but carved into human lives—and we publish it."

There are people all around you who had to make the very same choices you are making. They chose wisely in relationship to marriage, children, friends, education, career, money, where to live, where to go to church, etc. and they are living examples of lives well lived with peace and contentment and a personal relationship with Jesus Christ. Others chose poorly and they have lived a life of regret and sad circumstances. You can get a peek into your future by looking at their present. We can learn what to do by observing those who have lived life successfully. We can learn what not to do by avoiding the mistakes that others have made. Secondhand knowledge is a beautiful and priceless commodity.

Yet there are those who think they are different. We all like to think of ourselves as above average. We most generally like to think of ourselves as smarter than the average person, better looking than the average person, more talented than the average person. We hear things like "you are special, you are unique, there is no one like you in the whole world, there is only one you" and we get the misconception that somehow this means that we are exceptions to the rules. David suffered for his sins but "I'm not David", "that was then this is now", "David's mistake is he tried to cover it up" and similar rationalizations oftentimes are heard spoken from those who think firsthand knowledge is always the best decision, much to their eventual dismay.

Yes, you do have a unique fingerprint. Yes, your genetic make up is unlike anyone else's in the world. Your eyes are different, your feet are different, your voice is different. Even twins are not truly identical. However, the reality is our differences are minimal. We have far more in common with mankind than not. And when it comes to the laws of God, there are no exceptions to the rule. "The wages of sin is death" is a spiritual principle that applies to all. If it has been proven over and over again throughout the centuries, then we can be confident it still applies today.

The Bible is a prophetic book. The Lord loves us enough He wants us to capture a glimpse of the future. He wants us to see enough about tomorrow to help us live for today. The Book of Revelation is a vision of the future. It shows us what was, and is and is to come. Many of the things in revelation are happening right now or are on the cusp of coming to pass. There is one event foretold in Revelation that is greatly encouraging.

Revelation 12:7-12 (NLT) reads "Then there was war in heaven. Michael and the angels under his command fought the dragon and his angels. And the dragon lost the battle and was forced out of heaven. This great dragon-the ancient serpent called the Devil, or Satan, the one deceiving the whole world-was thrown down to the earth with all his angels. Then I heard a loud voice shouting across the heavens, "It has happened at last-the salvation and power and kingdom of our God, and the authority of his Christ! For the Accuser has been thrown down to earth-the one who accused our brothers and sisters before our God day and night. And they have defeated him because of the blood of the Lamb and because of their testimony. And they were not afraid to die. Rejoice, O heavens! And you who live in the heavens, rejoice! But terror will come on the earth and the sea. For the Devil has come down to you in great anger, and he knows that he has little time."

What an encouragement! The devil is defeated completely in the hevenly realm and is banished from heaven! His last act of defiance is to throw one big tempter tantrum on the earth. He may be doing that right now. It sure seems the world is in quite an upheaval. But what is also encouraging is that we defeat him as well here on earth through the blood of the Lamb and our testimony! The devil's time is short. The end of the age is nearer now than when we first believed.

But here is food for thought: when did the blood of the Lamb ever need assistance to defeat the enemy? Wasn't the cross enough? Wasn't the death, burial and resurrection of Jesus sufficient? What can wash away my sin but nothing but the blood of Jesus? So then why is the word of my testimony included in the formula?

I always interpreted that passage as saying that I need the blood of the Lamb and my testimony to overcome the enemy. But that is not what the passage says. It says "they overcame him". We individually need the blood of the Lamb, yes. We collectively need the word of our testimonies to help lead each other to the cross and to help us to remain under the blood of Jesus. "How shall they hear without a messenger?" "Go into all the world and teach..." We are called to share our testimony to the world about our firsthand knowledge of what the blood of Jesus did for us and what it will do for them. We are called to tell our children our stories of life before Christ and after Christ. We are called to be living epistles, living examples to the world that we can secure a better future, we can secure a happy tomorrow, we can know what lies ahead based on God's promises and His Word.

I may not know every detail about the future. I may not know every bend and turn on the path my life is taking. But I can know my destiny. I can know the end of the story. It doesn't have to be a mystery or a ........ shoot. God has given me a clear vision of the future based on the testimonies of others in His Word and in His people. I can get a peek into my future and I can predict the consequences of my choices.